Filmed Locally - Kitty Craft

CATSKILLS REGION — Catskills is a 2000 album from Kitty Craft, the musical moniker of Minnesota native Pamela Valfer. Valfer began recording her dreamy, low-fi, solo pop songs in 1994 with cassette releases. She added samplers and keyboards, incorporating programmed drum sounds with 1997’s I GOT RULEZ 7” and  1998’s BEATS & BREAKS FROM THE FLOWER PATCH, named after Valfer’s preferred recording space in Minnesota, which is where she eventually recorded Catskills. There is no indication on the album why she opted to name her album after the renowned mountain range; the title track is an instrumental, ensuring that her reasons will remain an obscured mystery without an explanation from Valfer, who is enjoying a bit of a career revival. 

The internet has been a double-edged sword for musicians, with streaming services severely impacting their livelihood with egregiously low royalty checks. On the flip side, it has led to many musicians enjoying a period of their music being rediscovered, which was the case with Kitty Craft. After a TikTok video using one of her songs went viral, an increase in interest led to a 2023 rerelease of Catskills with four additional new tracks. Valfer had left music behind to pursue her other passion and career as an artist, so the resurgence came as a surprise. Catskills stands as an identifiably 2000-era-sounding album, a relic existing somewhere in the transition from analog to digital. But Catskills transcends the trappings of goofier examples that, at their best, satisfy some form of nostalgia for the turn of the century. There is no doubt of the era it emerged from, but Kitty Craft’s dreamy sounds remain ear-catching and nuanced. Who knows if Valfer intended to conjure some aura of a lazy Catskill getaway, and maybe it doesn’t matter; in the end, it does.